How to Draw Tokiko (from Key: The Metal Idol)

In this tutorial, I will show you how to draw Tokiko Mima from "Key: the Metal Idol," in both human and robot form (since both were requested). I will go over the robot form first. Begin by drawing a large circle, then add the lower half of her face. Her cheeks are relatively high on her face, and her chin comes to a point. Add the guidelines for her eyes, nose, and mouth, as well as the vertical line that will help you line up her features. She has large eyes, so make sure there is a lot of distance between the two eye guidelines. The nose and mouth, on the other hand, should be drawn much closer together.

Once all the guidelines have been placed, draw the outlines of the eyes, nose and mouth. In robot form, her expressive is generally rather neutral, so don't make the tops or bottoms of the eyes arch very much, and make the mouth flat. Add her ears, as well.

Next, draw the basic shape of her hair. Do not add the details yet, just worry about making the hair look full and rounded without it being too large. Draw her irises, which are large ovals that do not fill up her entire eye. To keep her expression neutral, make sure her eyebrows are drawn levelly and don't arch too much. Draw her neck, which should be very thin.

Now, add the details to her hair by drawing extra strands and spikes. Add detail to her eyes; notice the outline of her iris is very thick. Draw the rest of her shoulders, as well as her clothes. Notice that her clothes do not have that many folds in them, which makes your job a little easier. :) Erase all unnecessary lines and clean up your sketch.

Color or shade your picture as you see fit. The coloring of her hair and skin is very subdued, unlike her human form, as you will see below.

Key's human form is very similar to her robot form, except her coloration is different and her face is more expressive. Begin by drawing a large circle, then add the lower half of her face. Her cheeks are relatively high on her face, and her chin comes to a point. Add the guidelines for her eyes, nose, and mouth, as well as the vertical line that will help you line up her features. The guidelines for the eyes should be curved upwards slightly; this will make the eyes look a little more expressive. She has large eyes, so make sure there is a lot of distance between the two eye guidelines. The nose and mouth, on the other hand, should be drawn much closer together.

Once all the guidelines have been placed, draw the outlines of the eyes, nose and mouth. In robot form, her expressive is generally rather neutral, so don't make the tops or bottoms of the eyes arch very much, and make the mouth flat. Add her ears, as well.

Characters with spiky hair are difficult to draw because of all the detail, so just draw the basic shape of her hair. Don't worry about all the details right now, just get the shape right and try to make it nice and full. Add her irises, which are large ovals and should fill up most of her eye. Add her eyebrows, and the shading under her mouth and chin.

Now, add all the detail to her hair, like all the extra strands and spikes. The more detail, the better. ^_^ Draw her shoulders and her shirt. Add the light glares and pupils to her eyes (all of which should be very large, since she has such large, expressive eyes). Also add detail to the ears. Erase all unnecessary lines and clean up your final sketch.

Color or shade your picture however you like. In this picture, the light source is behind her, which made the hair difficult to shade since the picture I was working from didn't show all of her head. ^_^ You don't have to shade it using this light source; wherever you choose to put the shadows, though, make sure the light source is consistent. For example, if the light seems to be coming from the left when you shade her hair, it should also appear to be coming from the left on her clothing and face.

Next, we will move on to a 3/4 view pose. Start with a large circle, and draw the lower half of the face. Make sure the cheek on the left side of the face bulges out slightly. Divide the face up with guidelines as shown. Make sure the guidelines for the eyes curve upwards, while the guidelines for the nose and mouth curve slightly downwards. Do not exaggerate this too much, though, or the proportions will be off.

Draw the outline of her eyes, as well as her nose, mouth, and ear. The nose should be a pointy wedge, and the mouth should be very small. Keep the eyes a little over one eye length apart, and make sure they follow the curved guidelines.

Erase the guidelines once you've gotten all the features placed correctly. Draw the basic shape of the hair, making it full and rounded without being too large. Don't worry about the details right now; you can add those after you have established the basic form of the hair. Add her irises, which will take up most of her eye, as well as her eyebrows. Shade beneath her chin, mouth, and on the side of her nose.

Add the detail to her hair by adding extra strands. Draw the light glares and pupils on her eyes, and add detail to her ears. If you like, add the little marks on her cheeks; they are quite common, and add a nice touch to the picture. Draw her clothes, as well. They don't have much detail or folds in these pictures, so that's one less thing you have to worry about. :) Make sure you erase all the unnecessary lines before moving onto the final step.

Color or shade your picture however you like. When shading the hair, make the highlights overlap the shadows so her hair looks more shiny.